Living Human Kidneys 3D-Printed In China

Researchers at a university in eastern Zhejiang Province have used a 3D printer to create living human kidneys. These artificially created organs, although small, appear to perform all of the functions of healthy human kidneys, including the breakdown of toxins, metabolic functions, and the secretion of fluids.

(Living Human Kidneys 3D-Printed In China)

According to a recently surfaced video report from China View, the raw material from which the organs are printed is a mixture of cultured cells and a nutrient rich hydrogel. The 3D printed organs are said to be able to survive for up to an incredible 4 months in the lab. Xu Mingen, lead researcher, explains that this process differs from traditional 3D printing, because the living tissue must have adequate room to grow, unlike solid plastic devices.

In her 2003 novel Oryx and Crake, Margret Atwood wrote about a pigeon, a transgenic pig that could grow replacement organs for humans.

Consider the "arti-forgs" from Philip K. Dick's 1964 novel Cantata 140, described more completely in his 1969 novel Ubik:

Probably Runciter's body contained a dozen artiforgs, artificial organs grafted into place in his physiological apparatus as the genuine, original ones, failed. Medical science, he conjectured, supplies the material groundwork, and out of the authority of his mind Runciter supplies the remainder.